The other two ASEAN countries ranked higher than Thailand this year are Singapore and Malaysia which are placed at 6th and 23rd rankings respectively.

Top on the index is South Korea followed by Sweden and Germany ranked second and third respectively and Finland cracked into the top five.

South Korea tops the international charts in R&D intensity, value-added manufacturing and patent activity and with top-five rankings in high-tech density, higher education and researcher concentration.

Bloomberg said Sweden owes most of its rise to improvement in the manufacturing value-added metric, while Nordic neighbor Finland jumped two spots in large part because of the rise of high-tech firms in the country.

The biggest loser in this year’s index was Russia, plunging 14 spots to No 26 almost five times the size of the next-largest drop in the rankings. Battered by sanctions and the after-effects of a couple years of subdued energy prices, Russia’s solid scores last year in manufacturing and productivity were destroyed in this year’s tally.

The US fell one spot to No 9 while Japan slipped to No 7 from No 4 as they lost their best in-world distinction for patent activity.